Publishing Agents

Writing can seem like a lone profession. While most people work in a collaborative atmosphere, writers often spend their hours in solitude, honing their craft. The fact is, however, that no one can become successful completely on their own. Publishing agents help you survive and thrive in a competitive industry, and enable you to make the most out of your literary success.

Publishing Agents Increase Your Marketability

The marketability of your work consists of far more than book jacket design or even content. As consumers, we purchase tickets to movies and buy books largely due to external factors--promotional events, critical reviews, and associations with other art forms. Publishing agents are experts in marketability, and can help you make the most of your book sales by marketing your work to its fullest extent.

Have you ever found yourself purchasing a novel at a bookstore, simply because you were impressed with an author's radio interview? Publishing agents line up speaking engagements, radio and television interviews, magazine articles, and author signings to generate buzz for your publication. Furthermore, they can line up smaller writing jobs for you, to increase your name recognition, and thus your book sales. The art of marketing a book is as precise as writing itself--and when you trust yourself to the experienced hands of publishing agents, the art of marketing is perfected.

Publishing Agents Negotiate Your Subsidiary Rights

Another important factor of publishing agents is negotiation of your subsidiary rights. Because each book deal is essentially a contract, you need to make sure your rights are best protected. Publishing agents come to the negotiating table with years of experience in author advocation. They can help you secure foreign rights, special sales, book club sales, and electronic rights to your work. In addition, they will help you work out the details of copyrights, and can sometimes secure you later rights for reprinting, running excerpts in magazines, and offering your work in a collective anthology.